Law and reality in publishing (seldom the same thing) from the author's side of the slush pile, with occasional forays into politics, military affairs, censorship and the First Amendment, legal theory, and anything else that strikes me as interesting.

23 June 2010

World Cup 2010, Match Day 13

This hasn't been a great tournament thus far for England, as indicated by this wonderful rendition of England's team. As my only feline friend the IPKat notes:

The big questions for IP fans are whether (i) the owner and any licensees of the rights in the characters featured in The Muppets may have grounds of action based on tarnishment of the reputation of these splendid creatures and (ii) Fifa will consider this to be an egregious act of ambush marketing in respect of which they will, given their well-known sense of humour, invoke the full range of criminal and civil sanctions as well as United Nations intervention.

I didn't watch the England game at all, and could give only half of my attention to the US match (due to other deadlines, etc.). That said, I spoke too soon about the referee's excellent reputation and track record: He and his assistants very nearly cost the US advancement to the round of sixteen with not one, but four dodgy decisions that essentially denied US goals. Dempsey's first-half goal was not offside; the elbow incident should have resulted in a red card and a penalty (and he and the assistant both had a clear line of sight); the wall was maybe eight yards away on that venomous free kick from Bradley, and I suspect that a full-distance wall would have frozen the keeper due to more ground to cover; and he missed a clear penalty against Altidore. Then there was the phantom handball/yellow card against Beasley... Two matches dropping four points due solely to officiating would have been too much!

At least this time, the US's early-in-the-match defensive frailty resulted only in a shot against the bar, and not a goal. Bob Bradley deserves a lot of credit for making appropriate lineup and tactical changes, although I still think the US would have been better off pushing the left back all the way into midfield; virtually all of Algeria's dangerous attacks came from midfield, not directly against the back line. Both teams deserve credit for trying to actually play football: Despite the defensive bias of Algeria's squad, the players really did try to score when they did have the ball. Conversely, the US played with urgency, but not desperation, throughout the match. Donovan's goal in stoppage time was just desserts, and the US kept a clean sheet at the World Cup for the first time in well over a decade. B+/B-/C+

Group D:

Germany

6

+4

Ghana

4

0

Australia

4

3

Serbia

3

1

after Ghana 0:1 Germany and Serbia 1:2 Australia. I watched the Ghana match, between weather-related 'net outages. I think the commentators on ESPN3 were looking to create some controversy more than anything else... or else I was watching a slightly different match. Certainly in the first half, and for most of the second half, Germany was much more dangerous on offense than was Ghana. Although Ghana was able to play the ball around the outside of the German defense and get some decent chances on goal, the German defense (until about the 65th minute) never got into the desperate-tackle mode that we saw in Ghana's box as the German attack probed. That said, the German attack did look a little bit less potent without Klose. The officiating was quite good, largely because the teams were both more interested in winning through playing than winning through intimidation. In the end, Ghana's inability to control the center of the field came back to bite them at both ends. B-/B/A

So that leaves us with the following round-of-sixteen matches:

US : Ghana (26 June)

Germany : England (27 June)

Vengeance is the theme here  Ghana knocked the US out at the group stage the last time around, and England has been beaten by Germany quite a few times in tournaments.

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Blog Archive

Warped Weft

Now live at the new site. I have arranged some of the more infamous threads that have appeared here by unravelling them from the blawg tapestry (and hopefully eliminating some of the sillier typos). Sometimes, the threads have been slightly reordered for clarity.

Other Blawgs, Blogs, and Journals

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How Appealing is aimed at appellate lawyers and legal news in general. If you care about the state of the law, start here — Howard's commentary is far better balanced, better informed, and better considered than any of the media outlets. To concentrate on the US Supreme Court, don't forget SCOTUSBlog.

Some academics' blawgs with a variety of political (and doctrinal) viewpoints:

The main European IP blawg of interest remains the UK-based IPKat, on a variety of intellectual property issues, with some overlap (with a less Eurocentric view) at IPFinance

The American Constitution Society blawg is a purportedly "liberal" counterweight to the so-called "Federalist Society" (which, despite its claims, should be called "Tory Society") that has yet to establish much coherence... but maybe that's all to the good.

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